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This conflates two quite different trends that should be considered separately: 1. A strange reluctance to financially support important software projects 2.

This conflates two quite different trends that should be considered separately: 1. A strange reluctance to financially support important software projects 2. Insistence on Free and Open Source software I agree the first point is a legitimate failing of the software community, such as it is. I get the impression only a few percent of software professionals (or for that matter software-powered organisations) have ever, say, financially supported a FOSS project. The second point though is not a failing. The problems with non-Free software are very apparent.

michaelt 4y ago
I'm not sure it's reasonable to separate the two. I mean, someone who is fitting bathrooms or writing books or teaching piano will say "here are my wares, here are my prices" and the customers will pay. But the major open source licenses all say "here are my wares, no charge, feel free to redistribute to all your friends too" - of course they're not paying, I just told them they don't have to pay. If I'm hoping that Amazon and Oracle and Facebook and Wal-Mart are going to pay $$$$$$$ to me and hundreds of my peers out of a sense of charity and generosity - doesn't that seem rather naive?
- MaxBarraclough 4y ago
  > I'm not sure it's reasonable to separate the two. One is a concern about freedom, the other is being a cheapskate. They're very different positions. Plenty of people donate to FOSS projects or to associated organisations like the FSF and OSI, but it's a shame the numbers aren't higher by a few orders of magnitude. Monetising Free and Open Source software is unfortunately not always easy, but it's not as if it never happens. Most Linux kernel contributions are from paid kernel developers, for instance. Some projects make money from paid support services (LibreOffice, RedHat), or offering a hosted deployment of the software (SourceHut). > If I'm hoping that Amazon and Oracle and Facebook and Wal-Mart are going to pay $$$$$$$ to me and hundreds of my peers out of a sense of charity and generosity - doesn't that seem rather naive? You're right that there's nothing to stop a major cloud provider from making easy money offering a managed service powered by FOSS, then giving little to nothing back to the project itself. This is the reason mongoDB is unfortunately no longer using a FOSS licence.
- kubanczyk 4y ago
  > But the major open source licenses all say "here are my wares, no charge, feel free to redistribute to all your friends too" It seems you've misheard then. Any vendor is saying "here are my services, here are my prices" and customers will pay (the real customers that is). The open source licenses are part of the deal but not an intrinsic part of the business, hence the distinction makes sense. It's up to us engineers to say: (1) I demand source code for my own benefit; (2) hey dude, pay for a RHEL subscription, apparently that money/power trickles to the actual engineers that do useful things for my own benefit! The rest of the world simply does not know about these two types of benefit if engineers don't speak. For (2), it's understandable that people think RHEL subscription is just 100% money wasted if they don't go opening any support tickets. Where instead maybe 90% of the money does go to execs but 10% benefits back the FOSS users around the world, figuratively speaking.
nerdponx 4y ago
Many FOSS projects are also or largely used by businesses, which sometimes turn a big profit as a result, and which don't contribute even a pittance back to the software they use. It's hard to be motivated to donate to such projects as an individual.
- MaxBarraclough 4y ago
  If a project benefits you, it's worth supporting, whether or not large companies are doing so. If anything I'd flip the argument round: your support is most needed when large companies don't pull their weight. OpenJDK and the Linux kernel don't need your donation. Also, there are plenty of good FOSS projects that aren't seeing much corporate use, such as perhaps KDE. (Although Google are known for using Linux as a desktop OS, perhaps including KDE, I'm not certain.)

michaelt 4y ago

I'm not sure it's reasonable to separate the two. I mean, someone who is fitting bathrooms or writing books or teaching piano will say "here are my wares, here are my prices" and the customers will pay. But the major open source licenses all say "here are my wares, no charge, feel free to redistribute to all your friends too" - of course they're not paying, I just told them they don't have to pay. If I'm hoping that Amazon and Oracle and Facebook and Wal-Mart are going to pay $$$$$$$ to me and hundreds of my peers out of a sense of charity and generosity - doesn't that seem rather naive?

MaxBarraclough 4y ago
> I'm not sure it's reasonable to separate the two. One is a concern about freedom, the other is being a cheapskate. They're very different positions. Plenty of people donate to FOSS projects or to associated organisations like the FSF and OSI, but it's a shame the numbers aren't higher by a few orders of magnitude. Monetising Free and Open Source software is unfortunately not always easy, but it's not as if it never happens. Most Linux kernel contributions are from paid kernel developers, for instance. Some projects make money from paid support services (LibreOffice, RedHat), or offering a hosted deployment of the software (SourceHut). > If I'm hoping that Amazon and Oracle and Facebook and Wal-Mart are going to pay $$$$$$$ to me and hundreds of my peers out of a sense of charity and generosity - doesn't that seem rather naive? You're right that there's nothing to stop a major cloud provider from making easy money offering a managed service powered by FOSS, then giving little to nothing back to the project itself. This is the reason mongoDB is unfortunately no longer using a FOSS licence.
kubanczyk 4y ago
> But the major open source licenses all say "here are my wares, no charge, feel free to redistribute to all your friends too" It seems you've misheard then. Any vendor is saying "here are my services, here are my prices" and customers will pay (the real customers that is). The open source licenses are part of the deal but not an intrinsic part of the business, hence the distinction makes sense. It's up to us engineers to say: (1) I demand source code for my own benefit; (2) hey dude, pay for a RHEL subscription, apparently that money/power trickles to the actual engineers that do useful things for my own benefit! The rest of the world simply does not know about these two types of benefit if engineers don't speak. For (2), it's understandable that people think RHEL subscription is just 100% money wasted if they don't go opening any support tickets. Where instead maybe 90% of the money does go to execs but 10% benefits back the FOSS users around the world, figuratively speaking.

nerdponx 4y ago

Many FOSS projects are also or largely used by businesses, which sometimes turn a big profit as a result, and which don't contribute even a pittance back to the software they use. It's hard to be motivated to donate to such projects as an individual.

MaxBarraclough 4y ago
If a project benefits you, it's worth supporting, whether or not large companies are doing so. If anything I'd flip the argument round: your support is most needed when large companies don't pull their weight. OpenJDK and the Linux kernel don't need your donation. Also, there are plenty of good FOSS projects that aren't seeing much corporate use, such as perhaps KDE. (Although Google are known for using Linux as a desktop OS, perhaps including KDE, I'm not certain.)